“But you’ll need some more money for stock and to fix the place up, won’t you?”
“I guess so.”
“Well?” He began to laugh while I talked my problem out. Finally he stopped laughing and I stopped talking.
“Get your hat and come with me,” he said. “I’ll get you the money.”
We went to the bank together. Ben signed the notes with his house as collateral. I got the money and the breakthrough began. But I owed the bank two thousand dollars! I no longer slept so well.
Anyway, down went the partition and the Seven Stairs expanded. Joe Reiner, then sales representative for Crown Publishers, happened in and, observing that I needed more book shelving, took me to see Dorothy Gottlieb, who was moving her Gold Coast bookstore[bookstore] to the Ambassador East Hotel. She had plenty of shelving to sell.
On a Sunday morning, Joe and I got a mover to bring in the new fixtures. We came puffing and grunting in with the shelving and nearly annihilated my sick ballet dancer, who was supposed to have moved out a week before. He lay on a mattress in the middle of the floor and, upon seeing us, let out a yell and drew the blankets up to his chin, crying, “What do you think this is? A Frank Capra movie? Here I lie on my virtuous couch, too ill to move, and you...!”
I developed several successful techniques for selling books. For example, when I read a book that I liked very much, I would send out a post card to everyone I believed might be interested in it also. There is not much room on a post card, so the words describing the value of the book had to be selected carefully. I avoided the dust jacket phrases. “Great,” “brilliant,” and “exciting” won’t cut any mustard. You must know your book and know your mailing list.
Another technique was the use of the phone call—a very delicate tool that must not be employed indiscriminately. The call must, first of all, be made to someone who you are reasonably sure won’t resent it. And you must know exactly what to say and say it quickly.
When a friend came into the store, I might greet him with “Ah, guter brudder, glad you stopped in. I have a book for you.” Or, “Here is a new Mozart recording you must hear.”